A new hard-hitting film “Mother: caring for 7 billion” should be required viewing for all doctors, policy-makers, and other people. Its message is that the exponentially increasing world population is the major cause of poverty, over-consumption, food poverty, riots, wars, de-forestation, ill-health, major crises, conflict, and climate change. It has vignettes from biologists, medics, and […]
Tag: education
Richard Smith: Teaching is stand-up comedy
Teaching, it seems to me, is much the same as stand-up comedy. One is much scarier than the other, but which is the scariest depends on who you are. I was left thinking about the connection after a recent bad experience of teaching. I do a lot of teaching these days, most of it unpaid and […]
Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka: Investing in our future—the African youth dividend
South Africa has a bright future—with strategic investments now, we will have a vibrant economy fueled by our “youth bulge.” I believe that investments today will pay a youth dividend of increases in economic productivity, innovation and quality of life. […]
Richard Smith: The power of women in Pakistan
I’ve been in Pakistan teaching around 30 young women on the day that the Taliban has bombed a girls’ school in north west Pakistan killing three girls and injuring another 62. For the Taliban it’s a crime to educate women. For me the women I taught were an inspiration. The conventional view of women in […]